Waters Wild
by Seldes Katne
Summary: As Queen Amidala and her attendants wait for Jar Jar Binks to return from Otoh Gunga, Handmaiden Rabé reflects on a childhood encounter with Gungans. Set during Episode I.


Waters Wild

by Seldes Katne

_Man has no tale for them. Oh! travelers swift; _

_From secrets to oblivion! Waters wild _

_That pass in act to bend a flower or lift _

_The bright limbs of a child! _

_Man has no word for their eternity –_

_Rhine, Avon, Arno, younglings, youth uncrowned! _

_Ignorant, innocent, instantaneous, free, _

_Unwelcomed, unrenowned. _

_excerpts from _Rivers Unknown to Song_, by Alice Meynell_

"I can't imagine wanting to live in a swamp," remarked Eirtaé, gazing out at the wet clumps of land dotting the banks of Lake Paonga, one of the largest lakes on Naboo. The young woman was one of the handmaidens who served Amidala, the elected Queen of Naboo, and one of five people gathered in a small knot to one side of a gleaming golden ship that had settled beside the lake minutes ago.

Captain Panaka, the Queen's Chief of Security, was scanning the swamp, blaster ready, looking everywhere except at his companions. The three other members of the group, the Queen and two of her other handmaidens, also watched their surroundings, but their gazes turned more often to each other.

A month ago, the Trade Federation had declared a blockade of the Naboo system and an invasion of the planet had soon followed. Escaping to Coruscant, Queen Amidala had met with the Republic's Senate to ask for help. When that request had failed, she and her staff had returned to Naboo with a different plan, based on a remark made by Jar Jar Binks, the sole Gungan member of the group; to ask the Gungans for help in defeating the droid armies of the Trade Federation.

Now they stood beside the Queen's ship, which had successfully landed in the swamplands near what Jar Jar had said was the Gungans' capitol underwater city. Jar Jar was being sent back to Gunga City to request an audience for the Queen and her staff.

"So, what do you think we'll find?" Amidala asked. "Do you think the Gungans will help us?"

"I doubt it," Panaka answered, still intent on their surroundings. "The few I've met were basically thieves and undesirables – even their own people didn't want them. The rest of the race has never been particularly friendly towards us, either. They might see this invasion as a chance to be rid of us."

Rabé, one of the Queen's handmaidens, remarked, "I'm not so sure." Responding to the questioning gazes turned her way, she added, "I met some of them once. They didn't seem too bad, although I had a difficult time understanding what they were saying."

Amidala glanced out along the lake shore to where two Jedi and a Gungan were speaking. Jar Jar Binks had seemed strangely subdued since the Queen had asked for his help in contacting his people. Now the gangly non-human hunched down, then sprang forward and dove into the waters of Lake Paonga, disappearing with a small splash.

"Well, while we're waiting, tell us about your meeting with the Gungans," Amidala suggested to Rabé. "Perhaps it will give us some idea of what to expect."

"It was several years ago," Rabé said, "when I was seven, and I was spending some time visiting my aunt and uncle and cousins…."

***

"We're supposed to be watching the shaaks," Rabé told her cousins sternly. "That's why Uncle Tinan sent us out here."

The two older boys, nine and eleven years old, were sitting in the shade of a grove of trees, tinkering with a toy that was meant to fly, but which had been damaged earlier in the week. The family's sprawling homestead was spread below them at the bottom of the hill. On the other side of the grove was a vast grassy field, the family's grazing lands for their herds of shaaks, bulbous four-legged creatures whose faces narrowed down to a rounded snout. The animals were docile and none too bright, and generally the youngest children of the family could watch over them without much trouble.

Unfortunately, Rabé's cousins knew this perfectly well, which was why they were fiddling with the toy instead of watching the herd. "Nothing's going to happen to them," her older cousin Parnat told her.

"And even if something does, Simmiss will let us know," added Brill.

"But if you're really worried about them, go watch them," Parnat said, handing Rabé a crook. The long stick ended in a triangular "hook"; it was used to nudge the shaaks in the direction one wanted them to go. Shaaks moved at an amble; even when startled, the best many of them could manage was a short trot before settling back into a walk.

Glaring at her cousins with an expression only a seven-year-old could produce, Rabé took the stick and pushed through the grove to the field beyond. Herding shaaks was a boring job, she knew, and she couldn't blame her cousins for wanting to spend their time doing something more interesting. But her parents had given her a stern lecture about behaving well and sharing the work before sending her here for three weeks, and Rabé didn't want her aunt or uncle to send her parents a bad report. Her family was well-off, but her parents believed their children needed to experience physical labor as well as intellectual pursuits, and that was part of the reason she'd been sent to visit her relatives.

The spring this year had been very wet, and the rivers were still running higher than normal. Large pools of water lapped around the roots of trees and shrubs growing in the hollows of the hills; the swampland at the southern end of the valley had nearly doubled in size. A river ran through the shaaks' grazing ground; normally just a small stream, it had swollen to three times its usual size, and the children had been warned not to swim in it until it returned to its former width and depth. The meadow ground was spongy underfoot in many places, and often the shaaks made squishing sounds when they walked.

Rabé picked her way across the field to perch finally beside a large rock that had been carried to the area ages ago by the river. Lying in the shade of the rock, his tufted ears barely visible above the meadow grass, a large tusk-cat watched the shaak herd, nose and ears constantly moving to pick up the scents and sounds of the meadow.

Long and lean, with tails that were equal in length to their bodies, tusk-cats displayed two sets of saber-like "tusks". One set curved down from the upper jaw on either side of the face, just behind the animal's actual canine fangs, and were actually made of stiff cartilage. The other set protruded through two points on the chin; these were real teeth. Neither set was used for biting or chewing, but they did give the cats a distinctive profile.

Rabé plopped down into the grass beside the feline guardian. Tusk-cats were natural herders; the Naboo colonists had domesticated them soon after coming to the planet nearly a thousand years ago. In the wild, the cats lived in small prides consisting of a male and several females and offspring; each pride gathered and protected a herd of wild shaaks, which were smaller and only marginally more intelligent than their domesticated brethren. The cats' natural instincts made them the perfect partners in protecting the Naboos' herds. The tusk-cats were raised from cubs, and many times provided a mount for their human partners as well as protection for the shaaks.

Rabé had made friends with Simmiss during her first visit to her relatives' home three years ago. The tusk-cat was growing old, his muzzle turning white, but he was used to being around humans, and he had permitted the then five-year-old girl to climb all over him and pet him. Sometimes he almost seemed to consider Rabé and her cousins to be part of his herd, nudging them with his nose when he didn't think they were moving quickly enough, and escorting them back to the family house at the end of the day's herding.

The shaaks had been out since midmorning. Now, in the afternoon sun, most of them were clumped in choice sections of the meadow, grazing contentedly. A group had wandered over to the river and were cautiously drinking at the edge.

"Lazy nunas," Rabé grumbled, comparing her cousins to the flightless birds that were so scatterbrained they sometimes walked right up to inhabited areas and even spacecraft. But she had to admit her cousins were probably right -- this was a quiet valley, partly because of its distance from the capitol city of Theed. Most of the people here were farmers and ranchers, with occasional artists or musicians who came to be inspired by the peace and the scenery. There hadn't been a violent crime in anyone's memory; most of the people didn't own any kind of weapons. There was no need for them -- the only danger came from the occasional wild animal, usually wild tusk-cats or the ape-like _veermoks_, and the domesticated tusk-cats usually ran them off.

"Veermok" was a word that had been taken directly from the Gungans, the amphibious natives who had been living on the planet when the original Naboo settlers had arrived. Secretive and harboring little love for the humans, the Gungans stayed mostly in the swampy areas of the planet. No one in the valley had seen a Gungan in many years, although a couple of the older farmers claimed to have caught glimpses of them as boys. Still, Uncle Tinan had remarked, with the rivers running this high and the swamp area so much larger than usual, it was possible that the Gungans might consider their territory to have expanded as well.

But the swampland was at the far end of the valley, and Rabé knew most of the residents considered the chances of Gungan sightings to be very slight indeed.

With little to occupy their time as they watched the herds, the children often brought books or art materials, played simple games, or wove chains of meadow flowers for something to do; since her cousins were only interested in their toy, Rabé plucked a double handful of flowers and set to work. Around her the shaaks continued their grazing; a light breeze rippled the grass, and the only sounds were contented chewing and the rush of the river and the songs of birds. One of the men who worked with her uncle had taught her to recognize some of the songs, including the sounds made by the peko-peko. He'd seemed surprised to hear those -- peko-pekos were usually rare in the area, he'd said, since they nested and lived in the swamps. Rabé noted absently that there seemed to be a pair in the forest – they'd been calling back and forth all day.

She was startled when, still lying in the grass beside her, Simmiss stiffened, ears swiveling to the left. The tusk-cat turned his head and pushed himself up on his forelegs; his mouth gaped open to utter a soft snarl.

"What is it?" Rabé whispered, peering in the same direction. Simmiss rose to his feet and crouched down, stalking forward and vanishing into the tall grass.

Peering over the tops of the blades, Rabé rocked back and forth, searching for movement in the meadow. The shaaks continued their grazing uninterrupted, although normally nothing short of either animal attack or powerful storm would disturb them.

The girl could see the trail Simmiss was making through the grass; the tusk-cat stopped several times, then continued forward, angling toward the thickly wooded barrier of the forest at the western edge of the meadow. The cat was a long stone's cast away from Rabé's position when he suddenly veered away from the woodlands; whatever he had sensed, the tusk-cat had been circling around to cut it off. Now the animal rose to full height and charged back toward the herd, bounding toward something that suddenly was making an obvious trail in the grass. Rabé heard the cat snarl, followed by a voice, and then an ominous sort of hissing sound. Simmiss's snarls abruptly cut off; a moment later a long, lean, grey shape rose out of the grass and stood looking down at something on the ground. It took Rabé a moment to realize what she was seeing.

Floppy ears, a long and mobile face, eyes set in stalks on the top of the head, plain leather garments... _A Gungan!_ The girl dropped into a crouch in the grass beside the stone, the only cover available.

The Gungan held a long, narrow pole in its hands, using the butt to prod something in the grass -- probably Simmiss, Rabé thought angrily. She clutched her crook in both hands. She needed to warn Parnat and Brill, but if she moved, the Gungan might see her.

Now the lanky alien turned its attention back to the shaak herd, and its tongue licked the side of its muzzle. It began to slowly approach the animals, stopping periodically to hunker down into the grass when the shaaks actually looked up at it. As soon as it stood still, the shaaks went back to grazing, and it would begin moving forward again.

The Gungan was working its way toward Rabé, who remained crouched beside the rock. But it was making no move to hide itself from the girl. Either it didn't know she was there, or it didn't consider her a threat.

Finally the Gungan got close enough to one of the shaaks for its liking. The alien raised the pole in its hand and touched the animal's flank. Instantly the pole again made the "fzzt" sound Rabé had heard earlier; the shaak leaped forward convulsively and tumbled into the grass. The rest of the herd, suddenly realizing they were under attack, took off in a flurry of clawed hooves and bleating sounds. The Gungan, its back to Rabé, seemed to be laughing, but made no move to follow. Instead, it bent over its victim, prodding the shaak with its pole.

Rabé gathered herself for a sprint. The Gungan was now kneeling in the grass, its back still toward her, carefully patting the shaak as if making certain the animal was plump enough. It reached for something on its belt. Rabé sprang forward, running up behind it, and raised the crook over her head. The crook's shaft slammed the Gungan squarely between the eyestalks. With a muffled, "Unh!" the alien slumped forward, landing in the grass next to the shaak. Rabé could see the animal's flank rose and fell; whatever the Gungan had done had only stunned it. So it was possible that Simmiss was....

Rabé raced to the spot where she thought the tusk-cat was lying and soon found Simmiss stretched out in the grass. Like the shaak, the feline was still breathing. Relieved, Rabé patted the animal's neck reassuringly and then returned to her victim lying in the grass. She kicked at the creature's strange pole until it was behind her where the Gungan couldn't reach it.

The Gungan groaned, four-fingered hands coming up to gingerly pat the area between its eyestalks. It blinked dazedly, shook its head, and rolled over on its side, to find itself looking up at a seven-year-old human girl scowling fiercely down at it, a shaak crook clasped in both hands.

"Don't move," Rabé ordered it in her most authoritative voice. "Or I'll whack you again!"

The Gungan actually cringed. "Don' hu't mesa! My give up!" It clamped both hands to its head.

The creature was so pathetic it was almost funny. "Shame on you!" Rabé scolded. "First you hurt Simmiss, then you went after one of my uncle's shaaks. You deserved to get a good smacking!"

"Mesa t'ought dis'n a wild h'ud," the Gungan said, still lying on the ground. "Mesa jus' wantin' somet'ing to ett."

"Well, you can't have any of these!" Rabé said, planting her free fist firmly on her hip.

"Not even one? Mebbe a liddle one?" the Gungan asked hopefully.

"No! That's stealing. Stealing is wrong."

The Gungan's eyestalks and ears dropped noticeably. "But mesa hungry," it all but whined.

Some of Rabé's resolution faded. Being hungry was no fun, although it wasn't a condition she'd experienced for long periods of time.

"Well, why didn't you say so?" she demanded finally. "All right, you can sit up." The Gungan levered itself into a sitting position, careful not to make any sudden moves. "My cousins and I brought some food for lunch, and there's some left. If you stay here, I'll get it." She stopped and leveled a forefinger at the Gungan. "But you have to promise to leave the shaaks alone."

The Gungan nodded vigorously, then winced; its ears and eyestalks moved back to their former positions.

The food, of course, was with her cousins; Rabé turned and took two steps -- when a long grey hand clamped onto her crook and wrested it away. The Gungan's other arm circled her body at chest level, pinning her arms to her sides. "No more whackin'," the Gungan muttered in her ear as it picked her up bodily and tossed her crook out of reach. Not a trace remained of the whining tone it had used earlier. The Gungan's free hand clamped over her mouth.

Rabé squirmed and kicked, but her captor clutched her tightly and made a raucous squawking sound -- the call of a peko-peko. The call was answered from the grove in which she had left her cousins, and to her horror, Rabé saw a second Gungan striding toward them from the grove.

This one too carried the narrow pole that discharged a paralyzing shock. "Tekked care'a dem," the Gungan remarked dryly, jerking its head in the direction of the grove, then stooped to peer at Rabé. "Enny more'a yousa?"

The girl glared at him. "There _will_ be when my uncle and aunt find out what you did," she threatened. "They'll get everyone in the valley together and come after you!"

"Thass gonna be 'while," the Gungan remarked. "Deysa not heah. An' when all t'ree a yousa waken's up, wesa long gone." The girl sagged in relief -- like Simmiss, her cousins weren't dead, only unconscious. The second Gungan lowered his pole until the tip was just under Rabé's chin. "Finish diss'n and less go," he instructed. Rabé tensed.

Behind them, one of the shaaks bellowed. Its call was echoed by a second, then two more. A moment later the whole herd was blaring and squealing, and, from the sound, pounding toward them in full flight. Over the din of the herd, Rabé could hear a chorus of whistles and shouts.

Her captors wheeled to face a shaak herd in full stampede. Pounding along behind them were half a dozen large, two-legged kaadu, which were also adding their honks and cries to the din. Mounted on each of the animals was a Gungan rider; the riders were providing the whistles and calls as they drove the shaaks across the meadow.

The Gungans holding Rabé prisoner dropped her and fled. Rabé scrambled to her feet and ran along with them. Driven by the persistent Gungan riders, the shaaks surged forward in their headlong flight; under the circumstances, the normally placid animals would trample anything underfoot, and Rabé sprinted, desperately looking for either shelter or something to climb.

Straight ahead was the pasture's swollen river, hissing and burbling over the rocks that usually formed its bank. Rabé knew she was a good swimmer, but she also knew that the high waters would sweep anything below a certain size along, smashing it against rocks and other debris.

She threw a look over her shoulder. The shaak herd was still in full gallop; there was nowhere else to go. Two of the riders had outdistanced the herd and bore down on her, one leaning far over in the saddle as if to grab her. Her two former captors had already plunged into the river. Rabé drew a deep breath and leaped after them.

Cold roaring water closed over her head. Dimly she heard the shouts and splashes as the shaaks and the Gungan riders plunged into the river behind her. She swam for the surface, snatched a breath of air, and was carried under again. The current slammed her into stones and the earthen river bank. Her flailing hands grasped at tree roots and empty water. Around her bobbed the shaaks, still bawling. She grabbed for one of them out of sheer reflex, missed, struggled for the surface again.

A hand snagged the cloth of her shirt and pulled. Rabé was drawn upward. Her head broke the surface and she gasped, gulping air, and this time her hands found something solid. A Gungan arm firmly circled her waist; the creature turned Rabé over onto her back and held her against it, its buoyancy keeping the girl afloat. Rabé sputtered and coughed.

"Yousa hang'n onto mesa," the Gungan was shouting. It was turning her in the water. Over its shoulder she could see an abrupt end to the water -- they had reached the river's falls, where the river dropped down into the lower pasture. One after another the shaaks plunged over the drop, squealing. "Tekk'n deep breff," the Gungan told her. "Yousa unnerstand?"

Rabé managed a nod, inhaled deeply twice and held her third breath, and the river disappeared out from under them. Rabé squeezed her eyes closed and clung to her rescuer.

The jolt of hitting the water again almost knocked the breath out of her. The Gungan had twisted in midair, using its body to cushion her fall as best it could. They plunged beneath the surface; the Gungan put its feet down and pushed off the bottom, taking them both upward. A few moments later they were both bobbing in the relative calm of the edge of a deep pool. The Gungan let go, and Rabé struck out for shore, the Gungan close behind.

A second Gungan had floated to the edge of the falls. It pushed off the river's bottom and dove gracefully into the pool below, landing right on top of a lean grey shape -- one of Rabé's former captors. Both vanished under the water to resurface further down the river, where the second Gungan wrestled the first one out of the water under the watchful eyes of two of the riders still astride their animals.

Splashing and yelling drew Rabé's eyes to the top of the falls again. By now the girl was in water shallow enough to allow her to stand, and she watched as her second former captor struggled in the grip of yet another rider, who had found some of the solid rock of the former river bank that was now half-submerged in the water.

The rider delivered a ringing slap to the back of its prisoner's head, then gripped the half-stunned victim by the collar of the tunic and the seat of the pants, and matter of factly pitched him over the falls. The prisoner, yelping, arms wind milling helplessly, struck the water with a loud "ploosh!". The rider managed to catch its balance at the top of the falls and stood with its hands on its knees, laughing.

"Yousa p'lutin' the water," the Gungan beside Rabé scolded mildly It sounded female.

"Sorry, Gener-ell," the rider called back, not sounding sorry at all to Rabé's ears. Then it -- no, he -- backed up a couple of paces and leaped over the falls, drawing his knees up to his chest and wrapping his arms around them. His long floppy ears rippled out above him as he canonballed into the pool with a resounding "splash!" and a great spray of water. He surfaced again to collar his prisoner a second time, dragging him out of the river and flinging him onto the shore. The prisoner was trussed up and dumped next to his accomplice in record time.

The Gungan beside Rabé shook her head. "_Spratlings_," she grumbled, in exactly the same tone of voice Rabé had heard her parents use when they uttered the word "Kids!" after she or her siblings had done something foolish (at least by parental standards).

A small group of shaaks came hurtling over the falls, plopped into the pool below and bobbed to the surface, bawling unhappily. They clambered out of the river and shook themselves. One of the riders used the butt end of his pole to nudge them away. "G'wan, yousa. Scat." The shaak honked at him, and the Gungan hunkered down to utter a "hrraaaaamp" back in the animal's face. Affronted, the shaak shied away, then made a "hrumph" sound and trotted off with the rest of its herd following. The Gungans laughed.

A third mounted rider appeared from down river, and suddenly the laughter ceased. All of the Gungans immediately drew themselves up to stand or sit at attention. Rabé stared at the newcomer nervously -- with a deeply lined face and hands, this Gungan appeared older than any of the others; its uniform resembled those of the other riders, but tied around its upper right arm was a black leather band. The older Gungan gazed at the two bound prisoners and nodded. In a female voice, it spoke to one of the patrol members on the ground, who answered in the same unfamiliar language.

Then the older Gungan looked at Rabé. Jerking her head at the girl, she spoke again, this time in the odd Basic the Gungans used. "Whosa dis?"

"Dissen a young _Naaboo_ wesa rescued," the younger female answered. "But shesa caught one'a dem," here the female nodded to the prisoners, "afore deysa ganged up on hersa. Whacked himsa onna head!" The Gungan patrol members grinned and nodded.

The old Gungan peered at Rabé. "Berry good. Iff'n yousa don' mind, wesa tekk dem off yousa hands, yiss?"

"Yes, thank you," Rabé answered. This older female was apparently the leader of the patrol. "Please, m'am, may, may I go? I'm not a prisoner too, am I?"

"No. Yousa free to go. An' thanks yous for yoursan hepp." The captain inclined her head slightly. Then she turned to the good-natured male who had cannonballed into the pool. "Mekk sure shesa h'okay. The _Naaboo_, deysa don' spend a lotta time inna water."

"Yess'm," the male replied. He eyed the prisoners with a mock scowl. "And yousa be-hev," he warned. "Or wesa lettin' the little _Naaboo_ hit yousa 'gain." He cautiously approached Rabé and bent down to examine her carefully. "Anyt'ing hu't?" he asked, tilting his head back and forth in an almost birdlike gesture.

Rabé shook her head. "No, I'm all right. Really. But my -- my cousins... They --" she gestured to the two captives on the ground "-- said they'd stunned them. They're up in that grove of trees near where you first saw us. Are they going to be all right?"

One of the prisoners grumbled, "'Course'n desa all right. What yousa t'ink, wesa some kinda monsters?"

The Gungan male nodded. "Deysa gonna be fine. The poles, deysa mos'ly on'y for stunnin' animals. Less go tekk a look at dem, yiss?" At the girl's nod, he straightened up and approached one of the riderless kaadu, taking its reins and urging it into a crouch. He untied a bundle from behind the saddle, slinging it over his shoulder. Then he led the way up the steep hill that led to the upper pasture area at the top of the falls. Once at the top of the hill, he let Rabé lead to the way to the grove.

Both boys were sprawled in the grassy undergrowth where Rabé had left them earlier that day. The Gungan laid his bundle down and rolled both boys over onto their backs. He unfolded the bundle and selected a leather canteen which he unstoppered. "Hold diss'n," he told the human girl. Then he plucked a wide leaf from one of the bushes and reclaimed the canteen, wetting the leaf with the canteen's contents. He laid the leaf over Parnat's mouth and nose. "Hol' dat dere," he told Rabé, who carefully held the leaf in place. The Gungan began repeating the procedure with Brill.

A few minutes later Parnat twitched, coughed, and opened his eyes. The Gungan plucked the leaf away from the human boy's mouth. "Yousa tekk the other'n," he told Rabé, who moved over to kneel beside Brill. The Gungan bent closer to Parnat.

The boy got a close look at the lean grey face peering at him. His mouth opened and closed a few times; his eyes widened, and he suddenly sat bolt upright, scrambling back away from the Gungan.

Yelling, Parnat backpedaled, tripped, somersaulted twice, scrambled to his feet and bolted down the hill. The Gungan watched him go, grinning. "Huh. Nuttin' wrong with dat'n," he remarked brightly, and joined Rabé beside Brill.

The second boy woke much more quickly than his older brother. This time the Gungan was careful to move to where the boy couldn't see him at first. "R-Rabé," Brill stuttered finally. "W-What happened? I heard something --"

"You and Parnat were attacked," Rabé said. She looked deliberately over Brill's shoulder at the medic. "By Gungans."

Brill made a choking noise. "Gungans? Everyone knows there aren't any Gungans around..." The medic uttered a soft cough. The boy froze, then slowly turned to look behind him.

"Heddoe!" the medic said cheerfully.

Like Parnat, Brill scrambled to his feet and almost fell into Rabé's lap. "It --You -- wha--?"

"I told you -- Gungans," Rabé said mildly. "Don't worry, this one won't hurt you."

"Not less'n yousa bite," the Gungan corrected. He twisted around to pull something else out of his pouch. "Heah. Tekk'n dese." He held out a handful of dried leaves tied with a green cord. "If'n yousa fill...prick'ly all over, tekk some'a dem and heat dem in whatta, den drink it like tea. Hepp to get yousa body back to normal, okey-day?"

Brill, eyes huge in surprise, gingerly took the leaves and nodded mutely.

"Good." The Gungan rose and slung the pouch's strap over his shoulder. Then he pointed to the leather canteen and leaf in Rabé's hands. "Yousa wanna use dem on yoursa _gissnal-ti_ after wesa gone."

"Gis-what?" asked Rabé as she stood up.

"_Gissnal-ti_." The Gungan simulated fangs with both hands on either side of his face. "Yoursa frien' down inna field. Do same to himsa as wesa done for diss'n." He indicated Brill.

"Simmiss!" cried Rabé. "C'mon!" She scrambled through the grove and flew down the hill. Brill hesitated at the edge of the grove, staring at the knot of Gungans in the field before trailing hesitantly after Rabé.

The older female and the rider who had rescued Rabé had moved into the upper pasture with three of their kaadu; beyond them, Rabé could see that the rest of the patrol, still in the lower pasture, were now all astride their mounts, along with the two prisoners.

The older female had stopped her kaadu near where Simmiss was lying in the grass; she and the other Gungan had dismounted. As Rabé approached, the older female said, "Wesa wan' to 'pologize for what dose two --" here she spoke a word that Rabé couldn't understand, "-- did to yousa an' yoursa fam'ly. Wesa tekkin' dem back with ussan-- been followin' demsa for sev'ral days. Deysa stole from oursan folk, too. Wesa promise yousa deysa goin' to be puu-nished."

Rabé nodded. The old female started to add something else, then looked past Rabé toward the grove. The Gungan medic was nowhere in sight, but striding towards them through the field was Uncle Tinan, clutching a small blast rifle. "You!" Uncle Tinan was shouting, waving the rifle at the Gungans. "You get away from them! Or I'll shoot!"

Brill glanced from his father to the Gungan leader and then bolted toward his father. Uncle Tinan caught him by the arm as he approached and spoke in a lower tone. The boy nodded, and Uncle Tinan released him; Brill ran up the hill toward the grove and disappeared from sight. Uncle Tinan was shouting, "Rabé! Get away from them!"

The girl backed up a couple of paces. "I have to go." She hesitated, then dropped into the bow her parents had told her to use when she was being polite to someone important. "Thank you!"

A moment later, Uncle Tinan stood blustering beside her; he brandished the small blaster rifle at the Gungans. "Get away from my niece and off my land. Now."

The Gungans exchanged glances. The younger female actually laughed, much to Uncle Tinan's apparent surprise. The older female stepped forward. Uncle Tinan's blaster fanned back and forth, trying to cover both of them at once. The Gungan leader's hand shot out and snatched the blaster away from him. For a moment, the Gungan peered down her very long nose at Uncle Tinan, who backed away, pushing Rabé behind him. The Gungan bared her teeth at the human male; then she turned and flung the blaster out into the field, causing the shaaks to skitter out of the way.

"Dis'n wuss _oursa_ land a'fore yoursa kin' plopped outten the skies," she sneered, drawing herself up to full height and moving to tower over Uncle Tinan, who was the shorter of the two. "Enny time _yousa_ wanna leave, iss okey-day by ussan."

The Gungan captain snorted through her nose. "The _spratling_, shesa gotten more sense an' heart than yousa. Shesa mus' tekk after hersa female parent." Dismissing Uncle Tinan completely, the Gungan turned to Rabé. Placing her right fist against the center of her chest, the Gungan bowed slightly to the human girl. Then she turned her back on Uncle Tinan and strode across the field to her kaadu. The younger female mounted her animal as well, and the pair wheeled to face the two humans.

The captain stuck two fingers into her mouth and whistled piercingly. She was answered by a whoop from the grove; the Gungan medic came loping down the hill, long legs pumping, and came to a stop in front of the humans. Jogging in place, he grinned and patted Uncle Tinan on the head. "Yousa wanna be careful wit' weapons -- yousa might hu't someone."

He turned to Rabé. "Nice to meetin's yousa. Loverly fam'ly. Gotta go. Bye!" He literally ran up his kaadu's leg and hopped into the saddle; the animal surged to full height. The younger female tossed the rider his weapon. The male raised the tip of the electropole to his face in a salute to Rabé, and the young female threw her a wink. Then the trio wheeled their mounts and cantered away across the field, heading south toward the swamplands.

***

"And Simmiss?" asked Amidala when Rabé had ended her tale.

"He recovered, which was a great relief -- we were afraid he might not, considering his age." Rabé smiled fondly, then sobered. "As far as I know, no Gungans have been seen in the valley since."

Amidala nodded. "What do you think, Rabé -- will the Gungans help us now?"

The handmaiden folded her arms and stared out into the swamp. The trees were close together, leaves and branches trailing in the water. In the distance, a peko-peko squawked. Beyond the swamp, they all knew, were the droid armies and ships of the Trade Federation, even now on their way to this place.

"I don't know, Your Highness," Rabé said finally. "I know that they helped my cousins and me, but that was because two of their own did the damage. The riders seemed decent enough, but when Uncle Tinan tried to push them around, they pushed back, and pushed back harder than he could."

"It's not as though we could push them around, anyway," Handmaiden Padmé spoke for the first time. "They _are_ the ones with the army. I think we're going to have to be careful how we ask them for help. You said the Gungans sometimes used words you didn't understand," she continued. "Do you think they speak something other than that odd version of Basic?"

"That would be my guess," Rabé replied. "I know the Gungan medic used a completely unfamiliar word for 'tusk-cat', and seemed very casual about it, as if it were the real word for the animal."

"Why haven't we heard Jar Jar Binks use this other language?" Amidala asked.

"Who would understand what he said?" asked Rabé. "None of us know this other language, and there weren't any other Gungans on board."

"Apparently the Gungans are more sophisticated than we gave them credit for being," Padmé said softly.

"We will have to consider this carefully," Amidala mused aloud. With that, the little party lapsed into silence, watching the lake for a glimpse of a Gungan's return.

Author's Note: Most of the characters here, including Handmaidens Rabé, Padmé and Eirtaé, Queen Amidala, Captain Panaka, Jar Jar Binks, the Jedi, and both the culture and critters of Naboo belong to George Lucas, creator of the Star Wars universe. They are borrowed without permission and the author was in no way compensated, either financially or otherwise, for this story. (Although stock options in LucasFilms might be nice....)

Shaaks are the plump, sheep-like creatures we see Anakin attempting to ride in _Attack of the Clones_. Much of the information about them and about the tusk-cats actually comes from the excellent resource _The Wildlife of Star Wars_, by Terri Whitlatch and Bob Carrau. The entire book features sketches of animals found on the various planets seen in the Star Wars movies: Degobah, Naboo, Bespin, Tattoine, Hoth, Coruscant, Yavin 4, Endor, and Alderaan. The listings for Naboo are the most extensive, and cover the grasslands (Theedside), the Gungan Swamps, and the Abyss of the planet's core. Part of this story was directly inspired by the entry about shaaks in the book -- apparently the animals are quite buoyant, and really can go over small or moderate sized waterfalls without harm.

We don't see tusk-cats in any of the Star Wars movies, but much of the information about them given above comes from the Wildlife book as well.

I'm always looking for good stories about Gungans. (My definition of "good" requires that the story treat Gungans respectfully, like real people, and not like something to be used for target practice or bashing. Granted, Jar Jar Binks can be annoying, but the entire race can't be like that.) Others authors whose stories feature Gungans include FernWithy (Gungans pop up as intelligent and capable supporting characters), LuckyLadybug66 (writes mostly about Jar Jar and Captain Tarpals), and Brollicks (who has written about one of the few Gungans to receive Jedi training). If anyone has seen any other stories of this nature, I'd be interested in hearing about them.

The title of this story is taken from the following poem. I collect odd bits of poetry from time to time, and this seemed to fit the pre-_Phantom Menace_ human view of Gungans as well as the rivers mentioned in the poem.

_Rivers Unknown to Song_

_Wide waters in the waste; or, out of reach, _

_Rough Alpine falls where late a glacier hung; _

_Or rivers groping for an alien beach, _

_Through continents unsung. _

_Nay, not these nameless, these remote, alone; _

_But all the streams from all the watersheds – _

_Peneus, Danube, Nile – are the unknown, _

_Young in their ancient beds. _

_Man has no tale for them. Oh! travelers swift; _

_From secrets to oblivion! Waters wild _

_That pass in act to bend a flower or lift _

_The bright limbs of a child! _

_For they are new, they are fresh; there's no surprise _

_Like theirs on earth. Oh, strange forevermore! _

_This moment's Tiber with his shining eyes _

_Never saw Rome before. _

_Man has no word for their eternity – _

_Rhine, Avon, Arno, younglings, youth uncrowned! _

_Ignorant, innocent, instantaneous, free, _

_Unwelcomed, unrenowned._

Alice Meynell

(_found in_ The Home Book of Modern Verse_, edited by Burton E. Stevenson_)


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